The subject application is directed to a system and method for generating a composite source user interface. More particularly, the subject application is directed to a system and method for generating a user interface wherein selected components of the user interface are generated and stored by separate components. The subject application provides the ability to generate or modify a user interface much more quickly and easily.
Generally, user interfaces, such as those provided on a document processing device, undergo frequent modification due to a variety of reasons, such as new user requirements, a new user interface framework, or the addition of features to be provided by the document processing device. In the past, user interfaces have been designed such that the graphical presentation component for the user interface is created and integrated with the text presentation component. Therefore, if the text of the user interface must be changed, such as to correct an error, update an interface, or to translate the text to another language, the entire user interface must be modified, including the graphical presentation, which is time consuming and prone to error. User interfaces have also been designed such that the text presentation component of the user interface is generated and managed by a system or component separate from the user interface. The graphical presentation component is generated and managed by the user interface itself. However, in such design, the interaction between the user interface and the system managing the text presentation suffers from delay insofar as text must be retrieved and merged into a composite graphical and text interface.
It is desirable to have a system and method by which a text portion of a user interface is able to be created, amended or altered quickly, while simultaneously allowing access to text very quickly and with assured data integrity.